


Round and Round We Go

by mggislife2789



Category: Criminal Minds
Genre: Bullying, Gen, Gun Violence, Murder, school shooting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-26
Updated: 2018-08-04
Packaged: 2019-02-07 08:21:56
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,071
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12837111
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mggislife2789/pseuds/mggislife2789
Summary: Disclaimer: I don't own any of these characters or their original stories. This is only for fun. It's where my brain goes after the credits roll. No copyright intended. Better safe than sorry. ;)





	1. Chapter 1

“Not bad today.” 

Zoey Gould muttered to herself as she tucked a strand of her unruly brown hair behind her ear. The mirror in her locker had been covered up with tape for days. She was unable to look at herself without hating her reflection. After all, she was “ugly,” “unlovable,” “unfuckable,” basically just completely worthless. The bruises on her arms had all but disappeared, and the general torture had subsided. Maybe they’d all finally gotten bored of it.

Since she was feeling a bit better, she decided to try looking at herself in the mirror, and while she wasn’t a model, she felt she looked okay. She liked her eyes, the shape of her lips. She did have a few pimples that wouldn’t go away and her hair was unruly as all hell, but maybe she wasn’t ugly. Maybe there was someone out there that would love her for all her flaws.

In an instant, she felt her forehead clash against the metal of the locker and fell to the floor, clutching her head and patting around to search for blood. The familiar warm trickle down the side of her face left a crimson stream, followed by the salty one just moments after. “You can stand to look in the mirror?” Bethany asked, smirking in Zoey’s direction as the blood trickled down her face. “Even on a good day, you’re still disgusting to look at.” 

While Bethany was her main attacker, she was never without her boyfriend, Tate, Tate’s best friend, Joey, and Bethany’s own best friends, Chelsea and Lia. The entire group of them snickered as Zoey picked herself up off the floor. “Why won’t you just leave me alone? What do you get out of this? Of hurting me?” She said, her voice strong to start but losing power with each word. 

Of course, they didn’t have an answer. And just as all the previous times, she started to cry despite her desperation to stay strong. “People wonder why you don’t have any friends,” Lia said.

“I don’t,” Bethany interjected. “An ugly, pathetic, cry baby? Who would want to be seen with her?” 

As they walked away, Zoey slipped to the floor with her back against the locker. Who would want to be seen with her? Talking like she wasn’t even there - she wasn’t really. Not anymore. 

When she started high school, she walked in confidently, feet planted firmly on the floor. Now though, she floated in and out, barely grazing the shoulders of her classmates as the spoke about her with derision - like she wasn’t even there.

The girl’s face was marked with stab wounds - all over the place. Thankfully for her, they’d been done postmortem. Based on what their evidence so far, the team came to the conclusion that they were looking for a teenager. The two murders were messy. If it wasn’t a teenager, it was a first-time killer.

“I think I found our unsub,” Garcia said as she walked in. “Her name is Zoey Gould. She’s 16 years old, a junior at the high school, and she hasn’t been seen by family or anyone at the school for two days. Her father however, says that a semi-automatic weapon is missing from the house.”

“It wasn’t locked up?” Rossi asked unbelievingly. 

Garcia shook her head.

Spencer shuffled through her papers. “She’s intelligent. Straight A’s. It stands to reason that she figured out the combination and took it to get revenge on the people that have wronged her. Have you seen all of the documented incidents?” He’d read the papers in under a minute, each word dug into his skin like a dagger, reminding him of his own past, so far behind and yet still so fresh. 

Every member of the team glanced toward the board where the pictures of a dead and mutilated Bethany, and her boyfriend Tate. “These two, in addition to quite a few others, have been on record as torturing her,” Spencer said, his eyes wide with frustration. “How was nothing done? She was pushed into lockers. She was bruised. She’s gotten cuts on her head and arms. There have been numerous incidents where she was humiliated in front of large groups of classmates, in class, the gym, assemblies. She’s been made fun of relentlessly. And this is only what’s been documented. I-”

Of course, he didn’t agree with the things she’d done, after all, he’d been in the same position and chosen the opposing path, but he understood her pain. Being so isolated like that, it had to wear on you. That on top of Bethany’s torture and it was a wonder she hadn’t snapped earlier. Her victims didn’t deserve to die, but she didn’t deserve what she’d gone through either. This was a no-win situation. 

His stomach was tied up in knots as Hotch received a phone call. It wasn’t good. “A girl with a semi-automatic as stormed her way into the school. She has hostages.”

Deducing a person’s motives was what he was good at. Day in and day out, he and his team saved people and avenged others. Spencer did love his job - most days. This was not one of them.

As the BAU entered the school along with SWAT, Spencer felt the bile rise in his throat. With his past experiences, he was the one most likely to get through to her. “Reid?” Hotch said. “You can do this.”

He didn’t have a doubt that he could at least get her to listen to him, but getting her to surrender, that was something else entirely. So much pain had been thrust upon her, and although wrong, this was her way of getting it out. 

Slipping around the corner, he approached, his gun holstered, and Morgan and Emily right behind him, guns drawn. “Turn around and go back,” Zoey said, aiming her gun at Spencer. Her hands were shaking. Although she was teetering on the edge, she wasn’t over it yet. Zoey’s classmates and schoolmates cowered underneath tables and chairs. Spencer suspected some of them were direct targets of her wrath, while others would just be collateral damage; he couldn’t let that happen. 

“I can’t do that,” Spencer said softly. He held up his hands, hoping to convey to her that she wasn’t under threat, despite the fact that his friends were at his back with their guns ready to fire. “I’m not going to hurt you. I-I just want to talk.” He felt for the children cowering in fear, but knowing what he knew, he felt for her too. 

“Why?” She cried, her voice breaking as she spoke. “So you can tell me you know what I’ve been through, that I don’t have to do this? It’s about time someone paid for everything I’ve been through. I get beaten and called names and spat on and these useless teachers don’t do anything!” She turned her gun on a particular teacher. When Spencer looked at him, he got a bad feeling in the pit of his stomach. “This is all I have.”

God, he knew that feeling. His eyes started to water as he spoke, and at first, he staggered over his words. “It’s not. I promise. And I do know how you feel - more than you will ever know.”

“How?” She screamed, startling her classmates still shaking with overwhelming fear. “Have you been called names on a daily basis? Have you been brutalized by people men and women, old and new for no reason? Have you-”

Spencer didn’t want to cut her off, but he didn’t want her to spiral further out of control either. “Yes, Zoey,” he said softly. “I started high school at a very young age. Every single day I was pushed, shoved, kicked, punched. I’ve had my head dunked in toilets. I’ve had every slur imaginable thrown at me. I was even stripped naked and tied to a flagpole. I was left there for hours.”

While Morgan knew that story (he’d spilled his guts after a very similar case), Emily did not. He couldn’t see her, but he could feel the change in the air. Emily wanted to kill whoever had tortured him. The feeling made him focus even more on Zoey. In these types of cases, there was such a thin line between make the right and wrong choices. “That’s horrific,” Zoey said, a tear rolling down her cheek and onto her jacket. “That can’t be real.”

“It is,” he said. It sounded like a fake story, but he needed her to know it was real - to know that despite what he’d been through, he’d come so far. “There was a girl I thought was cute, and one day, her friend told me that this girl wanted to kiss me, but she’d only do it if I was blindfolded.” He felt the vomit rise in his throat at the memory. “I met where she wanted to meet, blindfolded and nervous. She kissed me and started taking off my shirt. And then I heard laughing. She pulled the blindfold off, and my entire class was there, laughing and pointing while the girl’s friends pulled off everything but my underwear and tied me to the flagpole. I wasn’t able to get free for hours. And that was only one instance.”

Zoey’s face softened at Spencer’s story. “Didn’t you want to hurt them?”

“Yes,” he said honestly, “But I knew it was wrong…and I think you do too.”

She lowered the gun slightly. Spencer felt the air return to his lungs and then get punched out as she tried to point the gun at herself. “You don’t have to do this!” Spencer said hurriedly. He kept his hands where she could see them and stepped closer. “You’re still young. The circumstances might have you tried as a juvenile rather than an adult. You have so much life left to live.”

“I’m a bad person,” she sobbed. “Other people go through this to and they don’t do what I did. I am weak. I am pathetic. I don’t deserve to live!”

Spencer could feel his ability to get her to surrender fading quickly. “Everyone has a breaking point. You were pushed to yours, but you can still do so much. Please…let me help you. Let me and my team get you the help that you need so you can start to heal.”

Zoey’s eyes glanced from Morgan to Emily and back to Spencer; she was unable to focus much on any of them, her mind too abuzz with possibilities good and bad. “I’m sorry,” she whispered. For a second, Spencer thought he’d missed his chance, but she began to lower her gun. “I’m sorry! I’m sorry! I’m so sorry! I’m-” Her face turned bright red as the air left her lungs and she collapsed to the floor where Spencer met her. He wrapped his arms around the fragile young girl while Morgan and Emily got the hostages out of the area and the gun far from Zoey’s grasp. 

“I know how it feels to be alone, to be afraid of your own mind, but you can heal in time - if you allow yourself to.” Her grabbed her hands and stood up, bringing her with him as he tried to reassure her that she could heal and be redeemed for the damage she’d caused. “I need to put the handcuffs on you now, okay?”

Meekly, she nodded her head. The click of the metal brought on a fresh wave of tears and nearby officers stared in confusion at the kindness he was showing her. Pulling a tissue out of his pocket, he wiped the tears away and walked her to the police car. “What happens if I can’t get tried as an adult? I-I’m so scared.”

“I’m going to speak on your behalf,” Spencer said, without realizing he’d committed to the thought. “There’s a lot of evidence on your side. Be truthful about what happened and be truthful about your remorse.”

“Okay,” she whispered, her voice shaky as she sat down in the squad car. “I’m sorry for everything, and…thank you Agent.”

He nodded softly and turned around, leaving the teenager alone and his mind racing with the thoughts of how unfair the whole situation was. Zoey had been tortured, and in turn, she’d tortured others. Would the cycle begin anew?


	2. Ending the Cycle

“Dr. Reid, can you please describe how you talked down the defendant?” The judge asked. “Why were you in particular the one to approach her rather than another member of your team?”

Zoey had been convicted, as Spencer knew she would, but he had asked to speak on her behalf before sentencing. If he could get her the help she so desperately needed while she was stuck inside four walls, then maybe she could emerge better for the experience.

As an agent, it was difficult to tread that line of condemning what was done, but not condemning her as a person. Her experiences had been his own; they were all too familiar. “My Unit Chief, SSA Aaron Hotchner, thought it best that I be the one to approach her because of my similar background experiences.” 

The judge eyed him and nodded for Spencer to continue. “I was in high school by the time I hit puberty and I was tortured relentlessly - kicked, punched, spat on, stripped naked, humiliated in front of classmates - all of the same things that Zoey went through. Hotch, I mean SSA Hotchner believed that I would be able to empathize with her and therefore get her to surrender.”

“Dr. Reid, if you came from similar backgrounds and yet you ended up an agent, how do we excuse the crimes committed by the accused?”

Spencer stared across the room to where Zoey was sitting, eyes downcast, tears spilling. “You don’t excuse the crimes. What’s done is done, and the defendant has admitted as much. I’m not asking that you excuse her crimes, but that you take into account her extenuating circumstances during sentencing.”

“And those extenuating circumstances?”

“Zoey was tortured - day in and day out for years on end. She was beaten and bruised, cut and bloodied, knocked unconscious, humiliated, and these were only the documented cases. With inattentive parents at home, she took the initiative to try and help herself - tell those in positions of authority like her teachers and the principal and yet all they did was document. No action was ever taken against Zoey’s bullies. Every human being has a breaking point, your honor. Zoey reached hers. I ask that you allow her to speak on her own behalf.”

The judge turned his attention from Spencer to Zoey, his heart heavy and mind conflicted. “Miss, would you like to speak?”

“Yes,” she said, her voice shaky as she stood and wiped the tears from her eyes. “I-I‘m not proud of what I’ve done, your honor. All I can say for myself is that…is that I couldn’t take what was being done to me anymore. I d-didn’t know what else to do. I thought I had no other option because no one was helping me. I’m so sorry for what I’ve done.” A sob wrenched through her as she continued. “I can never make it up to the victims’ parents.” She couldn’t stop crying, so the judge took the opportunity to speak.

“Would you do the same thing if given the chance?”

“No, your honor.”

“Do you think you should pay for what you’ve done?”

“Yes, sir.”

“If you were to get out of prison, what would you want to do with your life?”

Zoey thought for a moment before speaking, “I hope that I might be able to become a therapist to help others through the kind of pain that I’ve been through.” She glanced toward Spencer, remembering what he’d had done to him. It seemed like the cycle never ended. Zoey honestly wondered if there was one. But she would never know unless she got the help she needed and helped others in return. She felt the bile rise in her throat as she began to speak again. “I killed two people and held up my school in a desperate attempt to end my own pain. I don’t expect to be given a light sentence. But please…will you please allow me to get help. Don’t throw me away into the system like so many others have done.”

Spencer’s heart sank for her. Her parents had done little to help her. Her teachers had done nothing. Same went for the principal. 

“Will the defendant please rise for sentencing?”

Zoey grabbed her attorney’s hand, her eyes never once opening as she waited for the judge’s sentence. “I, Judge Darren Evixa, hereby sentence the defendant, Zoey Gould, to prison for a period of up to 10 years with a minimum of five for two counts of voluntary manslaughter. I believe the defendant knows what she did was wrong and will not repeat her actions given another chance,” he said for the record. 

Then he turned his attention to her. “Ms. Gould. You are 16 years old. By the time you leave prison, you will be between 21 and 26. There is so much you can do with your life. I sincerely hope that you take advantage of all the help offered to you in your healing process and that you never forget what brought you here and the people you’ve hurt in the process. However, I also hope you can heal from your own pain and emerge a better person.” Nodding his head, he banged the gavel and stood up. “Court is adjourned.”

As she was lead from the courtroom in cuffs, she glanced toward Spencer. “Thank you,” she mouthed.

After the trial, Spencer couldn’t stop thinking about the young girl. Her parents had all but thrown her to the wind even before everything happened, but now that she was in prison, she rarely got visits from them. 

The team wasn’t so sure about it when Spencer had suggested going to visit her on occasion, but they knew his mind was made up. “I have to,” he said. “She has no one. How can I leave her there with no visitors? She’s still at such an impressionable age. How she fairs in prison could truly dictate the path the rest of her life will take. I just…I know you may not understand, but I have to.”

JJ leaned her head into his shoulder. “We know you do, Spence.”

It had been three months since her sentencing and her parents had been to visit her once. Each day, she milled around doing what the guards told her to do - when to eat, when to shower, when to use the bathroom, even when to go to therapy - but it was difficult to fully heal herself when she had no one.

She’d been able to befriend a few of the girls here, but none of them knew from experience what she’d been through. They were here for different crimes - some more violent, some less so. And the guards, well, some of the guards were nice, but most weren’t.

“Zoey?” It was one of the few guards she could call a friend, Officer Tanya Wilson. 

She was still in bed, or what they called a bed, waiting to be brought to breakfast. “Yes?”

“You have a visitor coming in today,” she said with a smile. “I don’t know who he is, but you’ll go at 1 after you’ve eaten lunch.” Officer Wilson had to get going quickly, so she wasn’t able to tell Zoey who it was, but who could possibly be visiting her? Besides her family, who’d all but abandoned her, she had no one.

Zoey couldn’t say she wasn’t apprehensive about seeing her visitor, but as she walked into the room, she saw a familiar face. “Dr. Reid?” No one had heard her; it was barely above a whisper. But her eyes filled with tears as she approached him. “Dr. Reid? What are you doing here?”

“I heard you could use a friend.”

She clapped her hand to her mouth as she sat down across from him - someone who understood her. “Yea, yea I really could.”


	3. Shedding the Past

Without Agent Reid coming to see her, Zoey was almost positive that she would’ve been lost to the system. Day in and day out behind four mottled walls surrounded by people who couldn’t possibly care less about her was draining both emotionally and physically. Her parents hadn’t been good parents before and since she’d entered prison, they’d only been to visit her twice - and that was early on.

It was her visits from Agent that had saved her life in more ways than one that kept her going. Because he had absolutely no ties to her. There was nothing between them that might compel him to come and visit her. He did it on his own time, of his own free will, because he cared. 

It was hard accepting that. That someone she didn’t know would care about her well-being more than anyone else she’d ever known, but through visit after visit, he convinced her to believe it.

She’d been in prison for seven years. 23 years old. So much of her life had been spent in here, but she was sure she was a better person for it. If she’d gone down the path she’d been on all those years ago, there was doubt she’d either be dead or still here and much more bitter.

Bitterness was for the people that were here when they shouldn’t have been - wrongfully convicted or in for short stays for a crime that shouldn’t have even been considered one - but she was meant to be here. She’d killed two people. In all likelihood, they could’ve grown out of the immaturity they’d inhabited in school, but she hadn’t given them a chance. 

Today was her hearing and Agent Reid would be coming to speak on her behalf. As of 5PM, she could be out of here and starting her life again. A clean slate. But she refused to pack her few belongings until she knew exactly what was happening. 

Like clockwork, Officer Wilson came by each cell to wake everyone up. “Rise and shine, inmates!” Before anyone else, she opened Zoey’s cell. “You’re getting out today,” she smiled.

“Hopefully,” Zoey replied, desperately trying not to hope for fear of the fall. 

The corners of Tanya’s lips turned up in the smallest of sad smiles. “You will. You’ve been nothing but a model citizen since you’ve been in here. You’ve developed programs in here for your fellow inmates. Made their own lives better. You have your GED. It’s going to happen for you. I can feel it.”

“Thank you, Tanya,” she whispered softly. “I’m nervous.”

“No doubt. But you’re on the right path. You have a lot to thank that doctor for.”

Didn’t she know it. “That’s an understatement.”

Through the morning, she ate her (hopefully) last crappy prison meal and said her possible goodbyes to the girls that she had helped over the past seven years, promising to keep in touch as much as her soon-to-be busy schedule would allow. And then it was time.

She was dressed in civilian clothing, something she hadn’t been allowed to wear for seven years. Her hair was pinned back and as she walked into the room she gave Agent Reid a small and hopeful smile. 

“We’re here to determine if Miss Zoey Gould has settled her debt to society, as well as whether or not she has shown herself to be a model citizen within the system,” the judge said, looking down upon Zoey with a glance that she couldn’t place. 

There were only a few people in the room, but she still felt like the world was watching. Tanya was here for moral support and to put in a good word, as were Agent Reid, a few of her fellow inmates and the mothers of both of the victims. It was them she still couldn’t bring herself to look toward. 

The judge allowed everyone to be seated and thanked them all for coming before asking if there was anyone who wanted to speak on her behalf. Tanya told the court how Zoey had been a model prisoner and taken to bettering herself to the moment she walked inside all those years ago. Next, a couple of her fellow inmates, both younger and older than her, told the judge how she’d taken them under her wing and showed them the way when darkness seemed all but certain. Finally, it was Agent Reid’s turn.

“Agent Reid,” the judge said, nodding with her chin in his general direction. “Over the past seven years, you have made it a point to come and visit Miss Gould. Do you believe she is ready for release into the civilian population?”

Standing up, he glanced back at Zoey and flashed a comforting smile. “More than any prisoner I’ve ever spoken for, personally or in the context of my position. Yes. I believe Zoey is ready to be released.”

“What makes you say so?” The judge queried.

“Seven years ago, when this all happened, I could see the genuine remorse in her eyes even while I was talking her down. She was a lost child, but she’s no longer lost and she’s no longer a child. The moment she walked in, she committed herself to turning her life around and has done exactly that ever since. Inside, she’s developed a reading program to assist illiterate inmates, as well as a separate program that specializes in helping students with their SAT scores. Both of those programs will continue under new leadership once she is gone. Zoey is and always has been exceptionally bright. She’s received her GED and has been accepted into the local community college contingent upon her release. She has a plan for her future and I’m confident that with the support of those around her and her own drive, she will keep from ever straying into that dark place again.”

When he glanced back, he saw Zoey crying, once again mouthing a thank you for believing in her and not giving up on her when it seemed like everyone else had. Both mothers of the victims spoke next. Neither could forget what she’d done, but they’d both forgiven her long ago. “I’m truly, truly sorry,” she sobbed.

“Miss Gould,” the judge said finally. “If you were to be released, would you ever repeat your actions?”

“No,” she said emphatically. “Never.”

“What are your plans upon release?”

She swallowed hard. By the tone of the judge’s voice, this seemed real. It was so close and she finally allowed herself to believe that she was leaving this place. “With Dr. Reid’s help, I have a group home where I can live upon my release. I’ve met with a few of the employees there and they’ve assured me that they can help me get a job so that I can pay my tuition. I want to specialize in psychology and get my Associate degree first. Eventually, I’d like to get a master’s degree in counseling and hopefully work somewhere like this. Without the kindness of the people in here, as well as Dr. Reid,” she said, still disbelieving all these years later of one man’s kindness. “If it weren’t for them, I don’t know where I’d be. I’d like to be that for someone else some day.”

“Do you have family to ground you?” The judge wondered.

She shook her head sadly. “Unfortunately no. My mother and father weren’t the best of parents before all this and they haven’t been to see me in years. I do have a few friends from high school that I continue to talk to. Dr. Reid has also given me his cellphone number so that I can talk to him whenever I need. I don’t have a lot to ground me, but I believe I had enough. Most importantly, I have that hollow feeling in my chest that developed after I took the lives of my classmates. It’s a feeling I wouldn’t wish upon my worst enemy, but I know what that feels like and I never want to feel that again. I believe that in and of itself will keep me from repeating my former actions.”

For a moment, silence hung in the room. It was so thick it was almost suffocating. Closing her eyes, she waited for the judge to put an end to it. “Miss Gould, please rise.” With shaky legs and a hopeful heart, she stood up and opened her eyes. “Miss Gould. What you’ve done cannot be taken back, but one’s past doesn’t always dictate one’s future. From your own actions, as well as the words of those here today. I believe that you want a different life for yourself and will never stray down this path again. Please, do not prove me or those who’ve put their faith in you today, wrong. I believe you can put this behind you.”

“Thank you,” Zoey sobbed. “I swear I won’t let you down. Any of you.”

As everyone filed out of the courtroom, Agent Reid stayed behind. “How do you feel?” He asked.

Over the last seven years, he’d become a big brother/mentor type for her. She wouldn’t squander this opportunity, for her own sake as well as his. “Nervous, but excited. Does the group home know yet? That I’ll be heading there today.”

“No, but I’ll call to let them know. Go get packed okay? You’re out of here.”

Reaching up, she wrapped her arms around his neck. “Thank you so much, Reid. I feel like I can call you that now.” He’d said years earlier for her to call him Reid, but she couldn’t until now. “Will you still drive me to the home?”

“I promised I would,” he said with a smile. 

“I know. I just…it’s real now.”

“It is. Time to start again. The past is just that, okay?”

“Yea. Was it Gautama Buddha that said, ‘just as a snake sheds its skin, we must shed our past over and over again.’” 

Reid raised an eyebrow. Her memory wasn’t eidetic, but it held the tools necessary for her to move forward. “That’s right. You are constantly changing and after everything you’ve been through, I know it will be for the better.”


End file.
